


Omelas For Idiots

by PrinceNux



Category: Original Work, Poetry - Fandom
Genre: But it also hurts, But that means I'm still alive which I should find to be a good thing, I think it's good, Other, This is an interesting piece of writing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-31
Updated: 2017-12-29
Packaged: 2018-08-12 06:41:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 63
Words: 21,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7924555
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PrinceNux/pseuds/PrinceNux
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Moving a majority of these poems to a new work. This one will be left up, but nothing else will be added to it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. RIP -A Poem For Leelah Alcorn

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Every LGBTQ+ person out there](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=Every+LGBTQ%2B+person+out+there).



Do not tell me

that it gets better

when another one of my

people another one of

my sisters

and surely thousands of brothers

but this sister

who I didn't even get the

chance to meet

this sister

whose blog I only knew about 

thanks to her suicide note 

this sister

whose parents can't even respect 

her pronouns after she is dead

they did not lose a son

they drove a daughter

their daughter

to end her life

and even after her body

is not yet cold in the ground

still call her son

your darling son died years ago

and now your daughter is dead too

and she isn't coming back

this isn't an accident

I know what suicide looks like

I have almost been a victim many times 

 

Do not tell me

that it gets better

when my sister is dead

and she is being misgendered

in the news articles and media 

 

Do not tell me

that it gets better

when she

Leelah Alcorn

that is her name

was pushed to suicide by an 

uncaring un-understanding world 

 

Do not tell me

that it gets better   
when my sister is dead   
and her parents still have the nerve    
to beg for sympathy and call   
her a boy    
even after death

 

Do not tell me

that it gets better   
when we are still killing ourselves   
only to be written off as mere statistics    
and gender-identity   
sexuality in and of itself   
still isn't taught in schools

 

Do not tell me

that it gets better   
when my sister is dead   
and I cannot attend her funeral   
all I can do is write shitty poetry   
and hope that she forgives me for not   
being able to speak around the lump   
in my throat

 

Do not tell me

that it gets better   
when countless people that were   
born in the wrong body   
that do not fit the norms    
will be misgendered at their funerals

 

Do not tell me

that it gets better   
because the harsh reality is   
that thousands of us will   
live life in fear   
drowning in a hopelessness    
and sadness that nobody else knows   
because not all of us have accepting   
families and friends   
and our suicides will be written off   
as mere accidents    
but nobody steps in front of   
a semi on accident

 

Do not tell me

that it gets better   
when my sister died knowing   
thinking knowing thinking knowing    
that her parents didn't love her   
they loved their son   
they will mourn their son   
when it is their daughter that died   
and she will never know a true mothers and fathers love

 

Do not tell me

that it gets better   
when the harsh truth is that   
if I do not change my name legally   
I too will be    
misgendered at my funeral

 

Do not tell me

that it will get better   
when my sister is dead   
unless you want to feel the wrath   
of my transgender rage   
over the injustice that is written across the scars on our wrists and signed on the dotted lines of our suicide notes

 

Do not tell me

that it will get better   
because my sister died not    
knowing that

 

 

 


	2. Knowing

I first knew I was transgender when I  
  
was 12 and I looked down at my chest one day  
  
and saw something other than a flat expanse  
  
of skin staring back at me  
  
and I wondered why  
  
since I still really didn't understand the difference  
  
between boy and girl  
  
why my penis hadn't come in yet  
  
  
  
But that's a lie  
  
it wasn't that sudden or dramatic  
  
it happened earlier than that  
  
but back then I didn't even know  
  
what transgender meant  
  
all I knew that  
  
when my friend and I were in the bath  
  
and he pointed at his penis and then asked  
  
to see mine  
  
I didn't have anything to show  
  
and I ran out of the bathroom  
  
crying hot tears of jealousy  
  
  
  
I didn't know what transgender meant  
  
until last year  
  
and I was so happy because I had found a word  
  
that described the tomboy haircut and the  
  
scabby knees and the ripped jeans and the  
  
worn out Chuck Taylor's  
  
besides it's just a phase  
  
you stupid silly girl  
  
  
  
When I look down at my body  
  
never naked  
  
always fully clothed  
  
because I look better in layers  
  
and see the soft flesh sitting on my chest  
  
the useless lumps that will never nourish a child  
  
because I'm too afraid to bring a defenseless child into  
  
this fucked up world  
  
all I feel is hatred  
  
and sadness  
  
and a deep sense of longing to have nothing  
  
but a flat chest  
  
flatter than a binder can give me  
  
  
  
Now I embrace this word  
  
label myself because I have to  
  
speak out and loudly correct people when they  
  
use the wrong name and say she instead of he  
  
because I am not a girl  
  
I never have been  
  
I was just born without the right genitalia  
  
and I know that somebody would be able to  
  
find my woman's body beautiful  
  
with the stretch marks  
  
the scars  
  
the fat and cellulite  
  
but I do not find this cage beautiful  
  
and all I want to do is break free  
  
and maybe drink a fifth of vodka  
  
  
  
I do not look like a boy  
  
but that is who I am inside  
  
and one day I will pass as a boy  
  
scarred cosmetic instead of statistic  
  
a smile instead of a handful of pills  
  
shirtless instead of new scars  
  
flat chested without a binder  
  
and maybe double digits  
  
  
  
I will stand up straighter  
  
no longer hunched over from the weight  
  
of my shortcomings and insecurities  
  
I will smile  
  
and not just because I'm imagining my funeral  
  
but not because I will be dead  
  
but when the time comes  
  
and I am laid to rest  
  
two feet wide and six feet deep  
  
I will not be misgendered  
  
the wrong name will not be placed on my tombstone  
  
  
  
And I still have bad days  
  
when I want to relapse  
  
and go back to the pills  
  
but I just remind myself that I will  
  
pass one day and I will no longer have  
  
to tell my teachers  
  
friends  
  
counselors  
  
therapists  
  
strangers  
  
my name and pronouns  
  
they will look at me and assume boy  
  
because I will be what my insides say  
  
my light will finally shine through  
  
and I am going to be around to see this  
  
ugly butterfly break out of his cocoon  
  
and greet the world with a smile  
  
that will not be forced


	3. typing with eight fingers

I don't think of dying as leaving  
more like stepping out for a cigarette  
and forgetting to step back in  
because I'm still out here  
just beyond your blurry eyes  
look at me sideways and I shine like a star  
but look at me head on and I whither  
under your disapproving gaze  
please stop looking right through me  
I'm afraid of what you may see  
when you look beneath the surface  
because I'm all jagged edges and ripped pants  
scars with the same story  
over and over again  
ver the course of four years  
don't look at me head on  
please stop it  
I'm just stepping out for a smoke  
even though I don't plan on dying of cancer  
and this cancer stick will stay unlit  
please don't worry about me  
I'll be okay  
just not today  
but maybe in a few years  
you're looking through me  
and I'm afraid of what you'll see  
when I lay my weapons down  
collapse into your arms  
and cry out all the tears that have been   
building up over all these years  
I'm afraid of what's inside my head  
I don't make my parents proud anymore  
I killed their little girl and gave them a stubborn boy  
in her place  
I hate the girl I used to be  
I don't know how to love myself anymore  
but maybe if I bare my scars to you  
you could try to help me put myself back together again  
I know it's too much to ask  
so I'll just step outside  
you won't see me anymore  
unless you look at me sideways  
then I will burn like the brightest star for you  
I love you


	4. The Dickless Wonder

my first binder came by air mail  
from China or Japan  
and i thought that it would fit  
after having accidentally told my mother i was transgender  
and needed something to hide my breasts  
the look on her face broke my heart  
so i backpedaled and said it was for cosplay  
my heart too broke that day  
because i was afraid that she wouldn't  
love her son as much as she loved her daughter  
  
and it went sour for a while  
we yelled instead of talked  
i over dosed and self harmed   
instead of asking for help  
and then i tried to kill myself  
in a rather selfish manner  
my little sister was right next door  
and i didn't care   
because right then  
i was packed and ready to go  
  
but who ever resides up there  
wouldn't let me enter the pearly whites  
or the burned and blackened coffin doors of hell  
which ever would get the biggest laugh  
because i assumed that my life was the butt of a joke  
that i wouldn't be told the punch line to  
rob told me it was sara's dad  
the same person that kicked him out too  
and i believe in that with all of my being  
because it's better than believing in nothing at all  
  
back to my being transgender  
which is all my poetry is about  
that and cutting and over dosing and the promise of sex  
still to be fulfilled  
and how much i hate myself  
i am a broken record  
but i read somewhere to write what you know  
and my sadness is all that i know  
i accidentally became my depression  
and lost myself along the way  
  
i am transgender  
which means i was given the gender that my reproductive organs expressed  
i identified as a girl for the first sixteen years of my life  
then tumblr and family told me what transgender means  
and i found that it applied to me  
at first i was scared  
i didn't tell my family first  
though i did tell my uncle first when i came out as a lesbian  
i told some friends first because facing the screen was easier  
than facing my family  
  
but it does get better  
and you should stick around to see that it really does  
because the sun always comes out tomorrow  
whether you sleep with your curtains closed or not  
the sun always comes out tomorrow  
annie agrees with me  
and we are going to lose more  
and more brother and sisters  
but we can stop this  
just listen to us  
love us  
accept us  
and for the love of god  
don't ask me what is in my pants


	5. salty queer

i lick the tears   
smudged on the lenses of my glasses  
littered among the fingerprints  
they taste like the salt that i pour  
into my wounds on a daily basis  
  
i don't bother to  
clean my glasses until i literally  
can't see out of them because of how  
dirty they are because it's easier to face the world  
when i can't really see it  
  
even when i can  
see what is coming at me once again  
i find it terrifying instead of comforting  
it's like being able to see the fist coming at you  
but not being able to dodge it in time  
  
as this metaphorical fist  
connects with my face  
i realize i haven't had the chance to take  
off my glasses before i was hit  
and wonder vaguely if glass will make my eyesight worse


	6. my mother

my mother   
she makes my teeth chatter  
she gives me chills  
and not the good kind  
all down my spine  
a roiling in the pit of my stomach  
right in the middle of my being  
i can feel her there  
sinking teeth and claws into my tender flesh  
she so easily rips me aside  
tears me asunder  
i just want her to be proud of me  
but i've forgotten how to be loveable  
i don't know how to make her proud of me  
it is a losing battle  
when she doesn't even love or accept me  
i don't know what to do  
she stomps on my fragile psyche   
she makes me want to die  
i just need   
selfishly want  
my mother to love me  
why can't   
why won't   
she love me


	7. purple boy

the tears they stick to my face  
burning like salt in a fresh cut  
though mine were never very deep  
they were always fresh and there  
and there was blood all over my clothes  
mainly my long sleeves and sweatshirts  
i remember the first time i bled through a shirt  
at school and the butter knives that i hoarded  
like i was gonna fight off my demons with little  
ridged pieces of plastic  
but dammit they kept me company  
when mother dearest was either too drunk or stoned  
to realize my first cut  
i mean come on lady it bled like a stuck pig  
i cut really close to the vein that time  
sometimes i wish i had had the guts to  
go deep enough that first time  
and i never would have had to deal with  
four years of self-destruction   
maybe if my mom had pressed me for the truth  
but it's more my fault than hers  
though for once  
that is not the reason why i am crying  
  
i am not enough of a boy  
but i'm too much of a boy to be a girl  
and i'm too much of a girl to be a boy  
but dammit who are you to label me  
you haven't asked me how this feels  
you only cared right after i tried to kill myself  
and only then i'm convinced you only asked because  
my little sister was in the next room  
and the doctor  
his name rhymed with cranberry   
and i hated him right away  
he told my my being transgender  
was just a diversion tactic  
like buddy dood sir mister fucking listen to me  
i am so fucking open about my mental illness  
it's all i talk about  
i am literally a broken fucking record  
i am loud and out and proud about everything that  
is going on with me  
both inside and outside  
and if i wanted to create a "diversion"  
i would have just slit my throat  
because then i would have made my mother happy  
by not being able to correct her when she continued  
to call me her sweet little precious little  
baby girl  
  
you say i can't be a boy  
because of the clothes i wear  
and the little tics i have  
how i do jazz hands when i'm excited or happy  
and this is a rare emotion  
you should be proud that i am an emotional guy  
instead of just a rock  
a pillar of broken pieces  
and yelling and grabbing and scars  
because you and daddy dearest  
you taught me that i should keep everything  
inside of me  
because you do not understand what is happening  
to your little girl  
and neither do i  
but i do understand enough to know that  
since i was seven  
i was just a kid  
i have known i was different  
and it was okay for other people to be a lesbian  
to be gay or bisexual or god forbid transgender  
but i couldn't do anything more exciting than wear  
mismatched socks and combat boots to school  
you didn't bother to educate me on those things  
and that's why when i found out what transgender meant  
through tumblr might i add  
i finally knew that i wasn't some broken toy  
i'm not a freak  
i am not a freak  
but you make me feel like a freak  
  
but i can't be a girl either  
because every time someone misgenders me  
or calls me she or her or you introduce me  
as your fucking daughter  
it makes me want to rip out my insides  
to show you that they have the word  
boy painted on them  
in blue and dripping paint  
my insides are male  
but i can't be a boy   
no i can't   
because i didn't show any signs of it  
growing up  
i came out too late for mommy dearest to  
believe or accept me  
i can't be a boy because i have a fucking vagina  
well you accept famous transgender people  
and i am sorry that i don't have the money to transition   
i would if i could  
but i'm pretty sure i'll be dead before then anyway  
  
i scared the dog with my sobbing and yelling  
he's still hiding in the bedroom upstairs  
and i should be doing my summer school  
but you have never been supportive of my schooling  
so i really don't see the fucking point  
and sometimes the voices sound like you  
they tell me what a disappointment i am  
how i am so wrong  
how you don't love me  
how you can't love me  
how i am going to hell  
i am afraid to go to sleep at night  
because all i do is dream about being dead  
they tell me in your voice  
that you would rather have me dead and a girl  
than alive and a boy  
and i am afraid that that is how you  
really feel about me  
like sorry i was ever born  
  
i am not a girl  
but you say i can't be a boy  
then i say i am not real  
you are grieving a ghost  
you say you want your little girl back  
maybe you should have loved her more  
both of you  
this is for both of you  
goddammit   
you ruined the best thing either of you  
has ever and will ever have  
but this idea  
this radical idea  
that i may actually know better than either  
of you what i was born to be  
this is what keeps me going  
late at night when i want to start  
stock-piling my trazodone   
maybe this time will be the charm  
and then you can put her name on   
my headstone and make me wear  
the prettiest dress that i never would   
ever wear while alive  
but a corpse can't talk  
so what does it matter  
i can be your little girl again  
even if she is just a body  
  
but fuck that  
i am going to keep on living  
and yes   
lopping off my breasts will solve  
a lot of my problems  
i am going to start t goddammit  
even if you disown me  
i have created my own little family  
we are the lost boys and girls  
the demon left in the presence  
of your non acceptance  
and i will be who i was always meant to be  
a boy  
my name is priestly  
i am a boy  
and even if you don't accept or believe me  
and that really fucking hurts  
but i am good at hiding things  
i believe and accept myself enough  
for the both of us  
and i have friends that   
believe and accept me too  
i am going to keep on living  
because as her i was just surviving   
but now finally after so many   
long and hard and trying years  
i am glad to be alive  
i am living  
as who i was meant to be  
and i literally cannot believe that you  
had the guts   
to use the fucking gender binary on me  
you fucking fag hag  
and stereotype me into your little box  
of blue for boys  
and pink for girls  
  
well maybe i like purple better


	8. growing up

going to church didn't stop the  
constant chattering of my teeth  
and my psych nurse says it's just  
a side effect  
but i'm certain that it is all the  
words that i have never said  
the ones that i am too afraid to say  
they are tearing my mouth apart  
and it feels like my tongue is going to  
be bitten in two  
maybe my teeth will jump out of my  
mouth and do a little dance  
a bloody little dance  
i have done those before  
so many bloody little dances  
over and over again  
  
my mother said that it would   
be disrespectful of my to keep   
the rosary from my great grama's  
jewelry box  
even though it was just a little old  
pink colored and plastic thing  
because i don't believe in god  
but dammit   
i just wanted to be closer to her  
when wearing her earrings aren't  
enough because her sweet old voice  
whispering in my ear  
is drowned out by the screaming  
screaming scream constantly screaming  
voices and i just want to be close to her  
i want to lay next to her  
feel her warmth next to me  
but she has been gone for years  
  
my friend i know that you  
are sad so very sad  
but it does not last forever  
and yeah i can't lie and say that  
i have never considered taking my  
own life  
i have nightmares about my suicide  
and those times i actually succeed   
but that is not the easy way out  
think of how much that would  
mess up your family and your friends  
my dear friend take your fists away  
from the side of your head  
put your safety on  
even making a finger gun isn't   
allowed in my house  
i even feel guilty for having the toy  
little two plastic cowboy guns that i keep  
in a box under my desk  
like they will protect me from what is inside  
of my head  
  
please put the blades down and  
yes it does matter where you got  
them from  
whether they made it out of the store  
in your pocket  
the cardboard rubbing against your thigh  
salvaged from pencil sharpeners   
because you do not need a scalpel  
the only surgery you are performing   
is on your self  
and your self hatred  
and that is not what growing up is about  
  
i remember wanting to grow up  
when i was just a little boy  
but there were no marching bands in the  
city there were only pride parades   
and i was too young to join in  
but now i would give anything  
to be a little kid again  
this is what keeps me up at night  
to the sound of my family breathing  
all throughout the house  
and i am the only one awake  
but growing up does have it's perks  
you get stronger  
you get to stay out later  
you get to move out  
you can date whoever you want  
i mean fuck yeah  
you can be who you really are  
because you are a grown lady or man  
you are all grown up  
and that is when your life truly begins  
  
so put down the pills the  
blades and turn the safety on with your  
finger gun  
take your fists away from your head  
throw away the notes you wrote  
because nobody should ever have to read them  
no i am not going to make you promise not to  
do these things when the world comes crashing down  
but i do want you to know that they are just a crutch  
they may help you walk now  
but later on they will only drag you down  
and growing up means moving forward  
though sometimes it is two steps forward  
and one step back  
but you will get better  
there is a light at the end of the tunnel  
and no it is not hellfire   
it is the bright light of a new day  
where the sun is shining  
and the smile on your face is genuine  
because growing up also means growing out  
out of your old habits and into the process of  
loving your body  
and who you have grown up to become  
because hating yourself  
but then loving and accepting yourself  
is what growing up is all about  
and you are going to make it  
dammit i believe in you  
and i will be there for you  
every step of the way


	9. bad for you

i am not a cigarette   
i will not give you a   
multitude of cancers  
your teeth and tongue and fingertips  
will not be stained by and with me  
your clothes will not hold my smoke  
like your blackened lungs  
in and out  
i am not the tobacco you breathe  
like the air is not good enough for you  
i am so much worse than that  
  
i am not a razor blade  
i will not give you rows upon  
rows of neat little cuts  
i am not the reason your hand holds  
steady enough to carve those   
straight lines  
like train tracks  
into your skin  
until they become your impenetrable armor   
layers and layers  
i am not your addiction  
i am so much worse than that  
  
i am not a bottle of pills  
i will not give you a false sense  
of medicated calm  
or the hollow of a stomach empty feeling  
when you are bent over the toilet  
at four in the fucking morning  
spewing your guts up and against  
and all the way into  
a white porcelain bowl  
this whiteness will be more stark than   
your skin when the sun does not touch it  
brighter than the walls of the hospital  
the sinks and the toilets and the shower stalls  
and even the towels  
this is the whitest white you will ever see  
i am not the things you do that make you sick  
i am so much worse than that  
  
i am not the empty beer cans  
along with the empty promises  
of just one more  
it's always the same with you  
but us humans are a pathetic bunch  
destroying ourselves and then turning  
to a story book deity to wash us of  
our sins and wrong-doings  
and make us whole and good and clean again   
i have never been the beer on your breath  
or the only thing in your stomach that day  
i cannot make you drunk  
i am not the reason why you get shit-faced  
i am so much worse than that  
  
i am none of these things  
these vices and addictions  
i am so much worse than those  
i will fill your head with my breathe  
the smell of day old sweat and self loathing  
i will make you want to live dammit  
we will make half empty promises to  
throw away our blades together  
until my mom found mine  
and i wondered where you disappeared off to  
i will not make you puke   
up anything but your lies and fears  
i will wrap them in bubble-wrap and rub down  
all their jagged edges until you can no longer  
feel them jabbing into your lungs  
and vocal cords  
keeping you from asking for help  
and oh baby  
i can make you feel so much better  
or worse than any type of alcohol ever can  
i can get you drunk off my skin  
the soft curves of my waist  
and my pillowy thighs  
i am worse than any story book  
hero or villain or otherwise  
because when the lights get turned on  
and the closet gets checked for monsters  
i do not go away  
you think of my always and every day  
my name is constantly on the tip of your tongue  
and i know how you long to wrap your  
arms around me and hold me close  
  
you see i am worse than   
all these things  
because  
i have a heart beat


	10. how not to be

step one:  
don't come out  
in any way  
keep your mouth shut  
about your sexuality and your gender  
because really  
as you will come to notice  
the cuts and scars on your wrists  
and the suicide attempts under your belt  
will be way more bearable than the disgust  
that your mother holds in her eyes  
in the downwards tilt of her mouth  
when she looks at you  
  
step two:  
keep your mouth shut  
about everything  
even if your mother sees what  
you are doing to yourself  
how you are slowly whittling yourself  
down to the very core of your being  
deny the empty pill bottles  
and the blood in the sink  
a red red ring around the shower drain  
  
step three:  
deny everything  
the bloodstains on your long sleeves  
the sweatshirts and layers upon layers  
worn on hundred degree days  
all of the empty pills bottles  
the alcohol and cigarettes on your breath  
the bags under your eyes  
hospital bracelets taped into old notebooks  
suicide notes hidden inside every word  
and every thought and every breath  
the urge and the need and the want and the  
promise of a sweet darkness  
you hunger for it  
it courses through your veins   
  
step four:  
remember that it is all your fault  
it is your fault for being born  
for being abused  
for more than half of your life  
the depression  
the anxiety  
the insomnia  
the self-harm  
your mother's alcoholism   
the smell of weed on your clothes  
the coffee stains on her teeth  
because she needs some kind of drink  
just to look at you anymore  
it is your fault for wanting to die  
it is your fault for being this way  
everything is your fault  
you are to blame for all the   
wrongs that are plaguing this world  
and you will spend so many years  
and countless sleepless nights  
so many hospital visits  
and therapists  
and pill after pill after pill  
trying to fix a body and a mind and a heart  
that your mother destroyed  
  
step five:  
learn to love yourself  
find friends and make them your new family  
learn to accept yourself  
be proud of your scars   
and the bags under your eyes  
the ground-down teeth  
the shaky hands  
because even messy teeth can smile beautifully  
and even shaky hands can hold someone tightly  
or yourself  
don't be afraid to hold yourself  
because sometimes you are all that you have  
revel in the feeling of being alone  
but rejoice about being with friends  
let yourself heal  
  
step six:  
remember that you are not a monster  
you are a human being  
and you do not have to be  
your mother's little boy or little girl  
if you don't want to be  
you are not other's failings  
or what has been done to you  
these have shaped and molded you  
into who you are today  
they taught you how to survive  
in a cruel cruel world  
let your wings grow  
so big that they cover you and everyone  
and everything that you love and hold dear  
hold your own hand  
wipe your own tears  
but also don't be afraid to let other people  
do those things for you  
and most importantly  
don't forget to let yourself live again


	11. Messy Room -narrative short write

Bottom line, depression is a cruel mistress. I know this for a fact. In the worst part of my depression, I didn't just suffer internally, but externally, too. As in, my personal hygiene went downhill. I hid certain parts of it pretty well. Greasy hair can be hidden with a hat, unbrushed teeth with minty gum, three days of the same Tee shirt with a sweatshirt. What couldn't be hidden, though, was the state of my room. I could have easily cleaned up the various messes. But, I didn't. Probably in a vain attempt to get my mother to realize that I wasn't okay. She didn't, though, and I was just left with the mess.


	12. (don't) be afraid (be different)

all of the inspirational posters  
say that you should not  
be afraid to be yourself  
be unique  
be beautiful  
be different  
  
but dammit anyhow  
that is easy for them to say  
with the little kittens  
and the multicolored #2 pencils  
when they have not walked in  
another's shoes  
  
it is not okay  
none of it is okay  
you should be very afraid  
to be yourself  
  
in a house built out of  
your mother's angry words  
and the blatant fact that she   
doesn't accept you  
and the disappointment in her eyes  
whenever she looks at you  
makes you want to have no eyes


	13. mother may i

i know things  
i feel things  
i see things  
that no young man  
let alone a child  
should have been through  
  
but it has left  
me with something  
besides tracks of scar tissue  
and internal organs shot  
to hell  
  
call it a super power  
a left over  
an after shock  
but i can see it in their faces  
and even if they have laugh lines  
and little wrinkles around their eyes  
no matter the crinkling   
something in their face is just  
so damn sinister  
  
and i see them  
with their plastic smiles  
and their clawed hands  
the empty beer bottles  
and the ripped up hand-made  
cards and pictures  
this is no childhood  
and i want to run away  
  
i am surrounded by them  
these fake people  
these picture perfect  
skin-deep parents  
and suddenly i am   
a little boy again  
  
i am so afraid  
sleeping under my bed  
so i cannot be found  
curling up under my desk  
biting my knuckles so i do not  
make a sound  
because no matter how much it hurts  
i do not want her   
to see me  
to hear me  
  
i am only a little boy  
smaller than my mother  
and she is so tall  
i cower in her shadow  
shake in the vise-like grip  
that she has on my wrists  
my upper arms  
my shoulders  
and the bruises may fade  
but the trauma nightmares don't  
  
i am so scared  
my mother is the big bad wolf  
she can swallow me whole  
her teeth are longer than my arm  
and i am so confused  
i don't know why she is so mean  
why she hates me so  
  
i am just a little boy  
and it all hurts so much  
mommy mommy mommy  
please don't hurt me  
please don't yell at me  
i can't just laugh off the bruises  
and your angry voice ringing in my ears  
mommy mommy  
please


	14. what rhymes with home

one. love  
love?   
i used to know what that meant  
or at least i thought i did  
i assumed it was what i felt  
when i looked down at my little sister  
sleeping next to me  
so peaceful  
none of the fearful yelling  
that i needed to come and pick our  
mother up off the floor  
when all i wanted to do  
was leave her lying there  
  
two. safety  
no  
that is a filthy lie  
one that i told myself many times  
because i needed to be there for  
my sister  
protect her  
look out for her  
shhh  
keep quiet  
don't let her know how much  
mother scares me  
how much i want to die  
i feigned safety for the  
sake of my sister  
  
three. whole  
foreign   
concept to me  
too young to understand that  
the empty pit in my stomach  
wasn't from hunger  
though i felt plenty of that  
but it was from where the love  
of a mother should have been  
so no  
i have never felt whole  
i am hollow  
the wind whistles through me  
and that is the only sound i make  
  
four. empty  
familiar   
i was comfortable with this one  
no longer surprised by  
the lack of food in our cupboards  
and fridge  
though the presence of all those  
damn liquor bottles were an   
ever-constant presence  
at least mother dear was consistent  
  
five. acceptance  
please  
don't make me laugh  
i only know what this word  
means because google told me  
heard it whispered on the  
stinking booze breath of  
family that were not my own  
but oh how i wanted to stay with them  
i needed a place where i felt  
that i belonged  
that i was wanted  
even if i was a jagged edge  
to their smooth togetherness   
  
six. abuse  
nightmares  
are not the only aftershock  
of this  
the taking of a childhood too soon  
i have the scars  
albeit self-inflicted  
and the bruises  
that are left deep in my psyche   
and even now  
being a young man  
and bigger than her  
i am still too afraid to fight back  
  
seven. broken  
jagged  
glass embedded in my feet  
and the palms of my hands  
throwing away every sugar-coated lie  
that she ever told me  
that she loved me  
she would always love me  
no matter what  
and then i grew up  
well  
at least my body did  
my hands and fingers got bigger  
shoulders wider  
legs longer  
but my heart  
my poor heart  
just shriveled up   
inside of me  
  
eight. loss  
bullshit   
you act like i took your  
daughter away  
but no  
she was never there to begin with  
a gender forced upon me  
that i didn't even know the meaning of  
and all because of my  
fucking genitals  
all because i have a womb  
instead of being able to pee standing up  
and that is all anybody sees  
my outside  
my breasts  
my vagina  
but i am more than my body  
i am so much more  
i have to be more  
i have to be  
right?


	15. TRANSPHOBIA

I would swallow tacks

to let the light out but

you only see my body


	16. hospital poem three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This poem, and the one after it, were written when I was on my third hospital visit, and had been transferred to sub-acute. Until now, they have both stayed in the moleskine that I brought with me. I hadn't even saved them to my Google Drive until now. It hurt a bit to type them out. But, I can't hide them forever. That's why neither of them has proper titles. This one was just written on my third day at sub-acute.

Dear Sarla

people look at me

and all they see is you

I hate that

and it makes me hate myself

you make me want to die

and hell if my pain tolerance

were higher I swear that I

would cut them off myself

because all they see is my

outsides and my double D breasts

and even if I carved the word

boy in all caps

into the soft plush of my vagina

a little lump that is always too small

to be seen as an erect penis

they would still only see the

panties shoved away in the back

of my dresser drawer

cuddled up next to my sports bras

that does nothing to hide my breasts

and I have been living inside you

for ten long years

my balls are ready to drop

I even started shaving the little

peach fuzz stache your father shamed

you into bleaching

I let my leg hair grow out

and willed the chest hair to grow

around my navel and then into

the fleshy V

that my hips create

all of my body hair grows freely now

to keep me warm

but mainly to spite you

and dammit what they see

when they look at me

eyes coming up from my crotch

to my chest

is the shadow of a girl

they see a beautiful blossoming

young woman

and yeah okay

I can see that too

you would have been beautiful

but I cut and snuffed out

your life in the middle of the

prime of your youth

I killed you

and have been in the hospital

three times because of this

because of you

and when my first hospital doctor

told me that my coming out was

just a diversion tactic

it felt like the week old cuts

on my wrist

opened up and all of you that

was left inside of me

bled out at his fancy shoed feet

you were pepto-bismol pink

and my empty husk filled up

with the blues of a thousand

unshed tears

I was a raging ocean of boy

my waves crashed onto your body

until you were drowned in it

and then you were gone

but when people look at me

all they see is you

and my blood is blue on the inside

but when they cut me open

they didn't see the blues

they saw my uterus

and my tubes

and the folds of my womanhood

hell yeah though

they still saw my fat

fat thighs

fat stomach

fat arms

fat fat fat

they still see my scars

and my crooked glasses

and my breasts

people still ask if I have

a dick

as if my genitals are any of

their goddamn business

and probably if I did

get surgery

my cosmetic scars would still

label me as a freak

I still wouldn't be enough of a

man for them

my penis would never be big enough

no man or woman would ever be

able to love me with the lights on

because hell

I'm still not able to pleasure myself

your body is a landscape

albeit a barren one

filled with mines

and I am too clumsy to

traverse it

your nipples only become erect from

the cold and the only wetness in

your boxers is blood

and I am afraid to look at you

in the mirror

because even I can't will something

to grow that wasn't programmed

from the start

and even the friends that never

even knew you

they hold you over me

I'm not a boy because I haven't

had The Surgery yet

what bathroom do I use

I don't count as a boy because

of my huge tits

I can't be a boy because

I like pink shorts

and the only things that have

change are my name

and my hair

I am a pansy

a girly boy

but fuck

I'm enough of a man for myself

I will never be a mother

and I will only let them fuck

me like a man

the swaying of my breasts

as I bend over a constant

reminder that I am wrong

but the only boyfriend

I've had since sixth grade

only asked me out because

he had a crush on you

I have to tell people that I am

a boy and remind them of the pronouns

that I use

over and over again

but technically I'm still a girl

well technically fuck you

honestly though Sarla

I wish people would be able to

see through to me

because when my light does

distinguish I don't want to

be buried in a dress

don't want my mother to cry

over her little girl

I think my sister would cry

for me though

she calls me her older brother

and once called my vagina a peen

she has come around

with flying colors

and she really gets it

I know that when it seems

like the world is against me

I will always have her

she sees through you

to me Priestly underneath

and Sarla

as long as I have her

I know I'll be okay

it makes the wait for people

to come around a lot easier

I love my sister so

and someday you really will be gone

boobs and period and all

I'm going to have a proper burial

for you when I get home

but until then

I'll take good care of your body

and I know you'll be watching over us

Love Priestly


	17. hospital poem four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> in this poem, each stanza has thirteen lines. I kind of did this on purpose. Thirteen is an unlucky number, and, when I was in the hospital before being moved to sub-acute, the rooms went: 12, 14. There was no 13th room. So, I made myself the unlucky room. The unlucky number.

Soldier

a gruff voice

over and over

right between my ears

duck

swim

crawl

shoot

shoot

louder and louder

my brain shakes

from the weight of

his cruel words

No

I say

in a clear voice that

does not shake or stutter

this surprises me

again I say it

No No No No

I will not do those things

I do not know how to

shoot a gun

probably point it at myself

I am a human

I am not a hammer

Listen

he pleads quieter this time

sit down across from me

let me show you my scars

look how my eyes water

look how my hands shake

I am human too

I do not know how

to be a hammer

I am too gentle

only know how to hurt myself

don't look at me

Sat

down across from him

I avert my eyes

taking quick furtive glances

now and then

I catalog his messy hair

his cracked and crooked glasses

the bad teeth from refusing

to get braces again and again

the blood crusted around his nostrils

turns my stomach painfully

looking at his scarred arms and blunt fingertips I say

you're no soldier

A

quiet and broken whimper

escapes him then

surprising us both

on instinct he reaches across

the table for my hand

he smiles weakly when I oblige

and murmurs

no I am a soldier

but not like them

I do not fight for

my country or for theirs

I fight for us for you

Understandably

this takes me by surprise

and when I look at him

more closely I realize he

is not wearing fatigues

we are dressed the same

except his clothes are

more tattered and old

he is me

only more haggard

and there is no familiar outline

of bandages

under his shirt

Smiling

sadly he pulls up his shirt

revealing crescent moon scars

where his breasts should be

the only familiar thing

about his chest and torso

are the nipples and stretch marks

free lightning tattoos

because even losing weight

time and time again

gain and lose

an endless cycle

doesn't make the past fade

Again

I protest

saying we are not alike

I am not at war

this is all some sick joke

how can we be soldiers

without guns and

tightly laced combat boots

where are my dog tags

and the rapidly beating heart

where is the screaming

where is the war

where is the war

Standing

up he walks around the table

taking my face in his hands

shockingly soft fingers and palms

after all these cruel years

leaning his face closer

the brush of chapped lips

against cold ears

he speaks to my very soul

his words loosen my heart strings

quickens my breathing

he whispers

it's all in your head

Now

it is my turn to shake

with weak knees

I fall against him

bury my face in his shoulder

breathe in my own musk

we stand silently

breasts flush up against flat chest

and then he steps closer

melds with me and we are one

I can feel his heart beat alongside mine

I feel much older

utterly alone


	18. taffy boy

i will stick to your teeth

am i spicy

or am i sweet

either way i will

bring back memories that

will make you cry

back when it was just

you and your little girl

and there wasn't enough money

for a beach trip

but you still bought her taffy anyway

and the two of you sat on the

front porch

watching the world move by

and you gently washed the

taffy off your daughter's face

but when your little girl

became too big to hold

when she squirmed away from your touch

and screamed about the bows

in her hair

you wondered where your baby girl

had gone

and it was hard to love her

because she was a stranger

to you

and to herself

and now your little girl is gone

leaving an arrogant

angry and impatient boy in her place

but dammit

he learned it all from watching you

and now this boy

wearing your little girl's body

eats a bowlful of taffy

trying to fill the black hole

that you left in the middle of his chest

is this boy spicy

or is he sweet

he sticks to your teeth

dries out your throat

makes your stomach hurt

and you resent him

for taking your little girl away


	19. My Omelas -Boaz Priestly

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Link to the short story: http://engl210-deykute.wikispaces.umb.edu/file/view/omelas.pdf

Last Friday, 11/20/2015, I came out to my class as a transgender male, in the name of Kantian Ethics. This type of ethics is named for the German philosopher, Immanuel Kant. The basis of his ethic is very similar to the well-known Golden Rule, though his version is worded in the older style of dialect: "do unto others as you would have them do unto you."

His version of the Golden Rule is the first of three in The Categorical Imperative. The second one states, "we can't predict the consequences, so actions must be governed by what is morally right." The third, and final one is much more blunt, stating, "we can't use other people as a means to an end."

The debate we had, where one side was for Kantian Ethics, and the other side was for Utilitarian Philosophy, was sparked because of a short story by Ursula Le Guin, titled, "The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas."

The short story is set in this fictional, utopian, town called Omelas. Everything is good, and all the people are happy. There is no need for drug-use, and the town is really up to the reader's imagination to be described.

But, underneath all this seeming contentment and utopia, a darker secret lies.

In the introduction to this darkness, the author writes, "In a basement under one of the beautiful public buildings of Omelas, or perhaps in the cellar of one of its spacious private homes, there is a room."

In this room, a child lives in fear and squalor. All the people of Omelas, children and elderly alike, know that this child is there. The child has no name, no discernible gender.

The children of Omelas, usually between the ages of eight and twelve, are told about this child. Sometimes young people come to see the child, and again as adults.

Most times, no matter how this matter has been explained to them, the young people witnessing this child, this pitiful thing, are shocked and sickened.

Again, more often than not, since the young ones are not inherently evil, they would like to do something for the child. But, they cannot.

For, if the poor child were brought up out of that basement...cellar...that horrible dark place, "all the prosperity and beauty and delight of Omelas would wither and be destroyed. Those are the terms. to exchange all the goodness and grace of every life in Omelas for that single, small improvement: to throw away the happiness of thousands for the chance of happiness of one: that would be to let guilt within the walls indeed."

"The terms are strict and absolute; there may not even be a kind word spoken to the child."

But, there is one thing that may make this realization less terrible and shocking for some: sometimes one of the young boys or girls who has gone to see the child doesn't go back home. This also happens for older men and women. They just leave. They walk away from Omelas, alone, west or north, towards the mountains. They do not come back. They keep walking.

Being transgender, I feel for this child a lot. But, I also feel, and relate with, the people, young and old, who walk away from Omelas.

When I was seven years old, and still living as a female, I realized that I was different than the other young girls my age. It wasn't just that I hated having my hair long, wearing anything but sneakers, ripped up jeans, and baggy sweatshirts, and was never a fan of dolls. I just felt, wrong. Not right. But, I didn't know what it was. I just knew that when my mother called me her little girl, it made my stomach hurt. I thought I was sick. A freak. Why couldn't I just be my mother's little girl?

This is where the child at the root of Omelas's happiness and purity comes in for me. I was living inside of myself. I was the parasite under my own skin. But, I did it to keep my family, and my friends, happy. I stayed quiet. Because, I have always put others before myself. I shut my true self away to keep my own little town in the sun. To keep my own little world spinning on its axis. For, if it were to fall out of orbit, I did not know what would happen, but I did know that it would be bad.

I stayed in the metaphorical "closet" until I was sixteen. Nine long years. Trust me, time moves the slowest for a child. A day can last a thousand years.

But, then, I had had enough. I had my new name, my big-boy-boxers on, and short hair. I was ready. I exploded out of myself in a burst of bright colors. I walked away from the gender norms that society had forced upon me from such a young age, I didn't even know what they meant. But, on that day, when the angry sixteen year old boy walked away from the childbearing and rearing, the dresses and daughter, mother, sister, I knew that I was never going back.

I knew who I was. Who I had always been. And, my rage was beautiful, and absolute. 


	20. what i want for christmas

i first started hating my body

when i was seven years old

it was christmas eve

and by then i was too old to believe

in santa

but we still put out cookies and milk

for my little sister

and i asked my mom if i could

eat the cookies and have the

milk that year

she just looked at me

like i was an idiot

and asked me if i wanted to

get even fatter and be

just like santa

that was the year that i

also decided i hated christmas

i mean sure

i still loved giving and receiving gifts

and the family and friends

but the two week break and the

endless snow days were the hardest

because that meant that i had to

spend all day with my mother

because by then

she was done with being christmas mommy

all smiley and cheerful

and loving

only saying nice things

and had gone back to her

bottle and blunt

my fingers and toes were cold

as the years wore on

and in our white house

the toilet water in mom's bathroom

froze solid

because we didn't have enough money to

heat the whole house

but we sure as hell had enough money

to buy liquor

but liquor doesn't make

a rumbling tummy quiet

and the warmth from brandy

only lasts for so long

before the sickness sets in

so i turned to vanilla extract

just a quick swig now and then

and i was warm

but not as warm as my little sister looked

with mom's arms wrapped snug around her

and the canned food drives that went

on at school

i brought in what i could

giving up my lunch or dinner to

those that needed it more

but we were always on the list for

the food baskets

and the gifts from the school santas

and the cardboard boxes of

food from the church pantry

wielded nothing but

slits in my skin that burnt even more

with the cold

and dusty oatmeal for breakfast

it's gotten better though

it really has

there is food in the cupboards and

in my belly

though i would rather not eat

but mom still comes home smelling of liquor

and christmas mommy still loves me

more than year-round mommy

ever could

ever will


	21. To the boy you will grow up to be

I have felt you for years  
since the tender age of seven  
before the onslaught of puberty  
you nestled up under my ribs  
closer and closer to my heart  
you snaked your fat little fingers  
up and into and out and around  
the tender caricature of life  
and when I was cut  
it is you that seeped out  
but no please don't think that  
I was trying to get rid of you  
I wanted to be closer to you  
to hold you in my arms  
for I was the only one that could  
heed and hear your childish cries  
for years I could feel you  
curling around my brain stem  
seeping into my addled brain  
you were the cough medicine that  
soothed not only my throat but  
also the depths of my being  
and I couldn't wait to meet you  
I died so that you could live  
this is not something to be sad  
or to place blame about  
because I saw you and the way  
that life surged through you  
how your toes curled and your fingers  
closed around the edges of new life  
I saw how you fought  
to keep your eyes open  
and I am sorry if I scared you  
I just wanted to say goodbye to  
my dear family and friends  
but they couldn't hear me  
and you felt that pain as well  
but dammit Priestly I gave you  
a second chance at life  
so live it to the fullest  
I will be watching over you  
you're gonna do great kiddo  
Love, Sarla


	22. an addict's lament

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was when I thought I was done with self-harm. I hurt myself for another two years after this poem was written.

i was an addict at twelve

but it wasn't a needle that i shoved

up and under my fragile preteen skin

pushing the euphoria in with a single movement

 

it was a blade that i

pulled across my virgin flesh

splitting the threads that so skillfully

held me all together

 

it didn't hurt the first time

boy oh boy did it bleed

through a wad of toilet paper and a washcloth

it was like a period that i could control

 

and that's what got me hooked

the pain that i could control

when my life was going down the rabbit hole

i just wanted to feel in control again

 

i've been in therapy since before

i took the scissors to my wrist

had a suicide scare in sixth grade

though back then i didn't know what suicide meant

 

i was just a messed up

kid sitting in the counselors office

abused converse scuffing the floor

i poured out my heart to her

 

it didn't help the first time

the second went by in a blur

only three appointments

maybe less but he was nice and had kind eyes

 

i used a variety of instruments

playing the strings of my skin

back and forth with the blade

back and forth

 

scars layered upon more sloppy scars

my left arm and wrist and shoulder

though that came later when i thought i was being sneaky

were a battle field

 

it lasted for four fucking years

four long years that nearly killed me

i still wear layers because the paranoia never left

and i still don't feel beautiful without that familiar stinging


	23. 11:16 PM

i had a dream that i cut my eyelid in half  
and then when i put a gauze piece on it  
and taped it up  
people kept on pulling it off and poking at  
my bleeding eye  
and this is what it feels like to be born  
and loved  
and hated  
and told goodbye for the first and last times  
just quit poking at my eye  
because it fucking hurts  
and this is what it feels like to be  
in a hospital for the first time  
after you have taken forty  
of your favorite pills and hoped to never   
wake up again  
i wasn't even born in a hospital  
but man  
i don't wanna go back  
but what if i need to  
does this make me weak  
my eye hurts


	24. paragraph

sitting on the toilet  
taking a shit  
because there is no nice way to  
say i am emptying my body of the  
garbage that i have shoved into   
my gaping maw of a mouth  
today  
tonight  
it's dark out  
but i'm not sure what time it is  
everything is blurry  
my eye is gummy  
i can feel the staples   
pulling out when i blink  
in and out  
they stick and unstick  
a timeless rhyme   
but dammit  
i saw the vanity scissors  
through the slit in the back of the drawer  
and i thought of taking them to my wrists  
and throat  
and thighs  
and arms  
wondered how sharp they would be  
didn't care what was caked on them  
i just wanted to let out  
this demon smoke  
trapped under my skin  
it tries to seep out through my mouth  
but gets caught between my teeth  
maybe that's why they have a faint  
greyish tinge to them  
the red lining isn't gums anymore  
it is simply self hatred and destruction   
and the skin of this innocent girl that  
i use to floss my teeth with  
because you must keep fangs razor sharp  
when all you have is nubs for finger tips  
and my toes are useless cuz all they  
do is crack and splinter and bleed  
my fingers fly across the keyboard  
but not fast enough  
falling behind   
slipping on the trail of spilled ink  
a purple and pink and red and orange  
and cotton candy blue  
mess running down my thighs  
all i bleed now is a broken string  
of i am so fucking sorry


	25. claws

look at me dammit  
i am the festering wound  
of an abused child  
forced to grow up too soon  
thrown into adulthood   
with nothing but the scars on my arms  
and the mean words that you  
drilled into my brain  
bouncing around the walls of my skull  
maybe a drill-bit to the temple  
would make them cut it   
the fuck out  
but it would probably be easier  
to muster up the guts  
to ask my mother  
why she resents me so

and my ribs are nothing  
but another cage  
keeping my heart from leaping out  
of my chest  
of exploding into a better life  
a life without you in it  
because goddammit  
twelve years old is way too young  
to start cutting myself  
i was too naive to even know  
or understand that death was   
the end of all ends  
but now i understand it   
all too well  
spend my nights   
restless in my sweat and blood stained sheets  
blankets kicked to the floor  
the want to die  
the need to feel   
those clammy hands wrapped around your throat  
long fingers digging into scarred flesh  
pulling you into the dirt  
with the promise that you will never  
have to open your eyes into this nightmare  
again

and can you really blame  
me for wanting it to   
end this way  
i always said that i was going to  
go out with a bang  
but dammit  
i clipped my wings for you  
pushed the fishhooks of your   
hugs and goodnight kisses  
deep into my feet  
through my wiggling toes  
rooted myself to the ground  
endured it so that you would  
leave my little sister alone

what i had was no  
childhood it was a piss-poor  
excuse for a place to call home  
and dammit it still is  
but when you look at me  
all you see are my flaws  
but have you ever stopped to   
look in a mirror  
because i can assure you   
it is not my face that you will find  
staring out at you

and i think that  
choking down the brightly colored tacks  
handful by handful  
would be less painful  
than you telling me what a failure i am  
but i don't know how to make you understand  
when you have known nothing  
but a mother and father's love  
it is hard to be shunned by your own family  
and i just want it to end  
but can you really blame me

look at me goddamit  
i am nothing but a walking sore  
an open and weeping wound  
instead of tears  
pus and blood drip down my cheeks  
still i paint you the same word  
over and over  
sorry sorry sorry sorry  
i just want you to love me  
why do you hurt me so

look at me dammit  
i am a poster-child   
for a missing childhood  
because cruel words  
and the coldness of soap  
bars and liquid  
the growing amount of cuts  
now faded scars  
but still there forever  
are all that i know  
all that my mother gave me  
my self-hatred and destruction are  
the blanket i wrap myself in at night  
cry into my pillow  
so you won't hear my sobs  
and find another reason  
to bring out your claws


	26. six word story

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This one is for my mother. I didn't kill my girl self. She did. My mother's daughter died when she took 40 Trazadone in an attempt to get away from her.

i didn't kill her, you did.


	27. dear drinking buddy

dear you

before you take my mother out after work

keep her for three and a half more hours

than she would usually be

please remind her

that she isn't like you

and has a family at home

waiting for her

with hungry bellies

and open arms

please remind her

that she has a son

that has literally not seen her

for three days

he needs her

and he wants to know

why she can't even look at him

he needs to know

where his mother went

the one that used to

let him wear his favorite purple

footie pajamas and rainboots

as they walked down to the store

for ice cream bars

and held him

when the nightmares got too bad

dear you

before you take my mother out after work

and send her home

in your bright orange jacket

reeking of you and liquor

please remind her

that she has a husband

who has loved her

for seven years

even though she continually drove him away

she has a husband

whose eyes light up when he sees her

she has a husband

who broke down his barriers

so he could hug her

and hold her close

without that ever-present fear of

her slipping away

again

please remind her

how happy he makes her

how happy she makes him

and the house that he lived in alone

for so long

is finally more than just a shelter

against the elements

it is a home

but it can't be that without her

dear you

before you take my mother out after work

please remind her to at least

call her son or her husband

to tell them that she won't be home

to make dinner

and that her son will get to eat

a store bought dinner

for the second night in a row

and then it just sits there

and stares at him

screaming that she isn't at home

please remind her

that she has people to

come home to

a husband

a daughter

and a son

please remind her

that she has a family dammit

and we need her

please remind her

that even though

she can't look her son in the eye

anymore

he will always need his mother

please remind her

that even though the liquor is

warm in her belly

she has a son at home

that is so

sick and tired

of raising himself


	28. grudge

i hold my broken edges tight. 


	29. you don't know

i have never been sexually assaulted

but i have been abused

since i was just a little boy

i was seven years old

and i felt so alone

and wrong

and hated

and everybody just

told me to smile

like that could

make the bruises on my wrists

from my mother dragging me around

fade

like it would make the hatred i felt for myself

go away

and i have stayed up all night

talking to my friends

so they wouldn't hurt themselves

or worse

and they did the same to me

and the circles under my eyes

and coffee on my breath

were taken so lightly

but how could i go to sleep

mother

knowing that my friends

had the power and

reasons

to end their own lives

to tear open their skin

to swallow handfuls of pills

how could i

how could i

and you yelled at me to go to bed

but dammit

i couldn't

because they had done the same for me

even on school nights

but you don't understand

because this hasn't happened to you

but to me

it is very real

it is happening now

it is all i know

the yelling

the crying

the blame

the abuse

and so much hatred

for you

but mostly for myself

and you do not understand

because it has not happened

to you


	30. #transgenderRAGE

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was written shortly after my first, and then second, psych ward stays. This is also what inspired my personal tag on Tumblr, #transgenderrage.

1\. The most accurate tag on a blog post that I have ever used has been #transgenderRAGE.

2\. The first hospital psych ward that I went to, they put a little sign on my room door that had PRIESTLY typed out on it with little puppies on the sign.

3\. The orderlies there used male pronouns and referred to me as Priestly. Which made me feel better.

4\. But, when I confronted the main doctor there, name rhymed with "cranberry," he accused me of using identifying as a trans male as a diversion tactic.

5\. I hated him, but bull shat my way through the sessions and got discharged after a week.

6\. Months later, cue the next hospital visit. This time, it was just a diversion tactic so I didn't off myself. Had my therapist drive me down there, I was surprised that she didn't put on the child locks. Though, I never have thought of throwing myself from a moving vehicle.

7\. In that ward, they just couldn't accept the fact that, even though it wasn't on my birth certificate, that my name was Priestly.

8\. They used parenthesis, quotation marks, and had Sarla as my first name on my door.

9\. My name is not a parenthesis.

10\. My name is not a quotation mark.

11\. My name is NOT Sarla. Though that is a beautiful name. San skrit for precious and all.

12\. I am not a thing to be swept under the rug. I am not a girl. I am a boy. My name is Priestly. Do not down play me. I am not a "diversion tactic." I am a living, breathing, feeling, beautiful boy.

13\. My name is Priestly.


	31. i pledge nothing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It always bothered me how my elementary and middle school had us do this. Every day before class started, and then also at every assembly. Because it wasn't true. It never was. And, it just seemed strange to me that the administration thought this was okay. This sort of....brainwashing, for lack of a better word. It just really made me angry. Still does.

the first time i pledged my allegiance

to something that i didn't believe in

i was in kindergarten

it was my first day in a real school

not just preschool

and everything was so big

it smelled new

and the floor still squeaked

under my shoes

but then the teacher had us stand up

behind our desks

we put our hands over our hearts

and faced the flag hanging near the

door at the front of the classroom

little hands over even smaller hearts

and i lied my way through it

because i knew

even back then

that there was not

liberty and justice

for all

 

this went on for years

and every time i said those words

every time i pledged my allegiance

to that piece of fabric

i felt sicker and sicker

and it made me even more angry

because it was so unfair

and watching the news made

me cry

and the world

was still eating itself alive

and all i did was stand there

with my hand over my heart

and mouth along to the

words that my classmates

said with such conviction

but with such robotic tones

 

then i stopped

sure i still stood for the pledge

during assemblies

but there was nothing left

in me

i had no more belief

and allegiance to give

to this flag

because it was not a symbol

of strength and togetherness to me

no not anymore

it only reminded me

of how different i was

and when the pledge was spoken

when our trust was promised

people like me

were not included in that liberty and justice


	32. not a monster

Something that really disgusts, and ruins shows for me, is when the writer's resort to demonizing transgender people as a shock factor. This has happened in Criminal Minds, and X-Files, and most likely a lot of other shows I've watched, that I don't care to remember right now. It is literally just so tactless, and horribly transphobic, and, for some of us, it can be triggering. I am not a monster. My brothers and sisters are not monsters. But, how we are treated by the media, THAT IS MONSTROUS. I am not a shock factor or a scare tactic. I do not go bump in the night. I am up close and personal. I am real. I am a human being, too. And, most of all, I am sick and tired of crap like this happening. It all leaves a bad taste in my mouth.


	33. why

i smell earthy

like wood

and the logs that i brought in

ignoring the shaking in my arms

from all the weight

and i didn't complain

because the wood chips

and splinters

stuck in my sweatshirt

hide the stench

of unwashed hair and skin

and the ever encompassing

fear

 

and i wonder why

my fingers and palm are not

big or strong enough

to grasp a log with one hand

and heft it up on top of

the others already held

in my trembling arm

but my hand is big enough

to dwarf a child's

 

and warm their small hands

between my own

the way their small fingers

clasp onto mine

make me want to cry

because to be needed

and wanted so desperately

and wholly by someone

is a feeling

that i am not

used to


	34. touchy feely part one

"you're a horrible person for not voting"

i know

"it's a chance for your voice to be heard"

my voice isn't heard already

so i don't see the point

and you know perfectly well

what i mean

when i say that

 

my voice hasn't been heard

for years

and years

a long damn time

my voice sounds foreign to my own ears

when it is caught in the echo

of someone else's

 

but to your government

and your president

i am invisible

i do not exist

i don't even have a shadow

 

my people are murdered

and all they get is a hashtag

my people kill themselves

and all they get is a hashtag

all i will get is a hashtag

years and years of life

reduced down to one

#restinpeace


	35. touchy feely part two

"have you masturbated yet"

no i haven't

"do you even know how to"

yes i understand the mechanics of it

you put a couple of fingers in and

wiggle them around

 

"why haven't you masturbated yet"

i lied when i told you that there was

a short answer to this

either answer involves yelling

and screaming so loud

that a fire blossoms

in the middle of my chest

and my voice cracks

and people can hear me on the

other side of the restaurant

 

this is not a quiet answer

it is not a quick one

it is the pull of a trigger

right into who i am

and it is a cruel

slash at my insecurity

 

have you ever heard of

bodily autonomy

or maybe personal space

questions that

a grown man

an elderly man

should never ask a teenager

let alone a transgender teenager

 

and the age gap

42 years

a year younger than my mother

doesn't make this a friendly thing

it makes you a pervert

 

(but i will answer this again

so more people than you

can look at me like i am

even more of a freak

than they originally thought

 

i do not masturbate

because looking at myself naked

even before getting into the shower

when i brush my teeth

and my breasts swing

like twin pendulums

over the basin of the sink

i want to cut it all off

 

and no

at this point

i do not care if i bleed to death

i have been bleeding for years

since that first person asked me

if i was a girl or a boy

 

and no

you do not understand

because you were not born

in the wrong body

you have the hanging anatomy

between your hairy thighs

and the biologically male on

your birth certificate

as proof of that

 

there are no

scars on your arms

or on your chest

 

parts of you are not going to

be cut off

and scooped out

so people will see you as

and address you as

male

 

so do not pretend that

you understand

because you do not

and you do not try to)


	36. A VERY ANGRY review of "You're Never Weird On The Internet (almost)"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fuck Felicia Day, yo.

Last Friday, I was up at the local library after school, just chilling and surfing the web, when I saw Felicia Day's memoir up on a shelf. I pretty much ran over and got the book then immediately checked it out. I started to read the book then, and, it was actually a huge disappointment.

Not only did the writing leave something to be desired, but Felicia Day turned out to be another one of those celebrities that is the epitome of: I'm rich and famous so I can write what I want and you lesser people can't be offended uwu.

Now, I only read to about the third chapter, and even that was hard.

Here are some of my personal favorite shitty statements:

"Because my impulse was to dress him in a flouncy pink tutu, but it was a small town and I didn't know if it would offend the saleswoman to make Santa a cross-dresser. But then I thought a liberal stance on the issue might, in a small way, help promote transgender rights in the area."

"I opened my mouth to lecture the kid on how princess dresses reinforce sexual stereotypes....."

"It was fine; people have palsy. I could look like I have palsy, too."

"....and I practically invented the whole "cute but offbeat hacker girl" trope on television. (Sorry. When I started doing it, it was fresh. I promise.)"

"This isn't a typical lady memoir."

"The only thing that got me through the daily service was a big Jesus statue hung behind the church pulpit. I thought his face, although a little depressed about being up on the cross like that, was kinda hunk."

I'm an atheist, and even I'M offended by that one.

"Also, homeschooling seemed like something an orphan would do, and I really wanted to be an orphan. Because, let's be real; they have it SO GOOD in kids' literature! They're sad but special, people love them against all odds, and they're always guaranteed a destiny of greatness. .......Orphanhood was a bucket list item for me!"

"An uncredited study she read once said, quote, "Girls become really stupid in science after they get their period, so you'd better learn as much as possible before that happens."

I was horrible at math even before Aunt Flow came along and became the bane of my existence, so clearly that one isn't true!

".....my mom basically trained me to become a geisha."

"Vow: I will never let my children live in a slum."

Here's mine: vow: I will never let any children read this horrible book.

Okay. That's all I got. Because, re-reading anymore of that drivel may just lead to my losing my Cheerios. But, I can clarify that there are at least two instances where Felicia Day made reference to school shootings in a joking manner.

This is actually a huge disappointment to me. I loved Felicia as Charlie in Supernatural, and, naturally, I wanted to love her book, too. But, that's just not possible. It's just a big pile of offensive garbage.

So, in leu of this, I am going to do something I have never done before with a book: I DO NOT RECOMMEND THIS BOOK TO ANYBODY. DO NOT READ THIS BOOK.


	37. I AM

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> http://www.glaad.org/blog/glaad-launches-trans-microaggressions-photo-project-transwk

I've got some of these, too!   
  
Here are my two favorites: It's okay if you change your mind.   
It's okay if SHE wants to come back.   
  
I am going to take this opportunity to introduce myself to you guys again. Hi. My name is Boaz Priestly Ybarra. But I mainly go by Priestly. I am a transgender male. My pronouns are he/him. And, I have felt this way since I was 7, so I can assure you I will not "change my mind."  
  
Because, even saying that implies that being transgender is a choice. Well, news flash: IT'S NOT! I mean, do any of you honestly believe that I would choose this for myself? The constant dysphoria, not being able to pass as male, the misgendering and dead-naming, and general transphobia are hell. I would not wish this on my worst enemy. This is not a choice. It is who I am. And, I have fully embraced it, because, it is better than the alternative of living life with this big secret that eventually destroys me. I am not going to be a statistic. I will not be one. I will not.   
  
I am a boy. My name is Priestly. I am a boy. I AM.


	38. fearful boy

0.

my fears come in fours

or to be exact

there are four of them

a nice even number

but i cannot overcome these ones

and there are certainly more

where they have come from

but these are the ones

that i live by

or the ones that live by me

either way

they are the controlling factors

that make up my psyche

 

1.

i am afraid of the dark

and no

i am not kidding

people usually don't believe me

when i tell them this

because i surround myself with

dark things and i guess

i seem like a dark person

and the argument

that when i close my eyes it

will be dark anyway

does nothing to comfort this

it just makes me feel more ridiculous

an eighteen year old with a nightlight

 

2.

storms

mother fucking storms

even a little bit of rain

can send me scurrying

to my room to hide under

a pile of blankets

as if this can protect me from

the elements

and driving in it is even worse

i white-knuckle my way through

the miles and the hours

feeling the wind

and pouring rain

hail snow sleet thunder

and lightning

it sends waves of fear to my bones

and i grit my teeth so hard

i fear my teeth will crack

and splinter

like the trees and fences and power lines

 

3.

it is not dying that scares me

i am not afraid of death

i embrace it

i will be the curator

of my own destruction

but it is dying alone

that scares me the most

and yes

i know that even if i were to die

with other people

i would still die by myself

because my light snuffing out

will not be like anyone else's

i know this

and that does not scare me

what scares me is being alone

when i die

i don't want to die

by bottle or pill or knife

with my only company being

my self-destruction

the dark passenger will not escort me

to the other side

but i wouldn't mind dying

holding your hand

 

4.

i am afraid of my mother

but this is not something that i can

just come out and say forthright

it has to be treated casually

just slipped into conversation

taking the words from

what is your favorite kind of cake to

and i am afraid of my mother

but anyway

what is your favorite flavor of frosting

and the key is to say this quickly

let the sentence blur together

let the thickness of the tongue

slur the vowels into one long string

no spaces are needed with this

confession

because no matter how this is said

this little confession

an admittance of what is wrong

of what haunts my sleep

and my day time

and all my time

people will still look at me like

i am this little broken thing

but no

i am not broken

i will not let her break me

but this fear

it will not go away

and i am ashamed of it


	39. family doesn't end

i smell like a family

there is drool on my shoulder

blending into the fabric

of my flannel

where i held my friend's baby

and i kissed her head and

her little face

and told her i loved her

and she giggled

and burbled back at me

and soaked my shirt in drool

 

there is dirt and grit

clinging to my skin

and my hair

where i held my friend close

after so many months of

radio silence on both our parts

and told him i loved him

and i smell like him

a lingering scent of

earth and travel

because for a nomad

the road is their home

but now he is so domestic

and underneath his usual smells

he smells like soap and clean clothes

and while this is strange

i am happy for him

 

i press myself into my friends

an extended family

ever expanding

i try to take in as much

of their scents as i can

because i naively hope that

i can drown out the smell

of fear and sleepless nights

and cold sweats that cling to me

i do not want to smell like my nightmares

 

i let them permeate my skin

and they stay with me

even if they are miles

and years away

i keep little parts of them

and they keep me going

they keep me whole

 

because family doesn't

end with blood

but it doesn't start there

either


	40. a letter

my hands are shaking

not with anxiety

i tell myself sternly

but with the caffeine

and too sweet bagel i had

for lunch

this is a sugar rush

or it might be the cold

that is turning my toes pink

setting my teeth chattering

and making my chest tight

maybe it is something else

but i don't want it to be

please just let it be the cold

and not some ridiculous fear

of being alone

 

i am just another echo

against the walls of

this house


	41. an open letter

...to the guy in my class that said he didn't like graphic novels because they were "fake":

 

1\. Time is man-made

2\. Gender is a social construct

3\. You paid fifty dollars for glorified rubber and fabric

4\. Shut up


	42. relapse

i left some of myself

behind last night

sitting on the edge of my bed

shaking in a batman tee shirt and boxers

the smell of fear wafted off my skin

and when the razor met my flesh

i was surprised that it did not sizzle

or protest in some way

though i suppose that may have been up to me

but i kept going

scratching until i bled

taking off some hair as well

and i wanted to slice right in the middle of my arm

but i was afraid of bleeding out

because right then

i didn't want to die

i was just tired


	43. PULSE

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> #prayfororlando

the breathing of the world

is erratic

but for some it has stopped altogether

and i worry

i wonder if it could happen to me

because of course it could

but just the act of thinking that

i could be calling you

texting you frantically

because i have not heard from you

and the phone is just buzzing next to you

but you can't answer it

baby you can't pick up the phone

why can't you pick up the phone

please pick up the phone

good god please answer

is simply too much

 

and to think that

a fellow human being

would do this to you

my brothers and sisters

is sickening

the world is at war

and it is not on foreign soil

it is right here

in the streets

and the night clubs

where we should be safe dammit

because we need safe spaces

for this exact reason

but how safe can it be

when you can't pick up the phone

baby please pick up the phone

 

and even though

none of my blood and bone

were there

i feel this deep in my core

a kind of sadness

that makes me cry in coffee shops

rocking back and forth

in front of people that i don't know

and i can spend hours curled up

in a chair

making myself smaller and smaller

maybe i will disappear altogether

and this will not happen again

but of course it will

it always does

 

because

the right to carry a gun

out of the spacious locker in

their homes

and into the streets

is more important than your lives

 

and god i am so sorry

that you have to live among these people

that you

my beautiful wolves and lionesses

have become the hunted

we are not prey

we are not wrong

we are not a sin

and this

being yourselves

and loving who you want to

should not be a death sentence

 

#prayfororlando


	44. I SAY

you say fifty people

I SAY FIFTY GAY PEOPLE

you say nightclub

I SAY GAY NIGHTCLUB

you say the shooter was mentally ill

I SAY HOW DARE YOU PERPETUATE THE STIGMA

THAT MENTALLY ILL PEOPLE ARE SOMEHOW DANGEROUS

WHEN THERE HAVE BEEN COUNTLESS NEUROTYPICALS

THAT HAVE DONE HORRIBLE THINGS OF THEIR OWN VOLITION

you say this was isis

I SAY HOW DARE YOU CONTINUE TO SUPPORT THIS ISLAMOPHOBIA

THIS WAS THE WORK OF ONE MAN

ONE MAN WITH A GUN

AND NOW FIFTY OF MY BROTHERS AND SISTERS ARE DEAD

SO I SAY HOW DARE YOU

TRY TO MAKE THIS ANYTHING ELSE THAN WHAT IS OBVIOUSLY IS

THIS WAS A HATE CRIME

AND THE WORST SLAUGHTER

-BECAUSE THAT IS WHAT IT WAS-

IN HUNDREDS OF YEARS

AND IT WAS A HATE CRIME AGAINST THE LGBTQ+ COMMUNITY

SO HOW DARE YOU TRY TO DOWNPLAY THIS

TO A MENTAL ILLNESS AND AN AFFILIATION WITH ISIS

BECAUSE MY BROTHERS AND SISTERS ARE DEAD

AND YOU SAYING well this happens to other people all the time

ERASES THE FACT THAT YES I KNOW THIS HAPPENS TO OTHER PEOPLE

BUT THIS HAPPENED TO GAY PEOPLE

AT A GAY NIGHTCLUB

AND NOW A PLACE THAT SHOULD BE SAFE

FOR MY BROTHERS AND SISTERS

AND FOR ME

IS NO LONGER SAFE

BECAUSE A MAN WITH A GUN DECIDED THAT

SINCE WE ARE DIFFERENT THAN HE IS

WE SHOULD NOT BE ALLOWED TO LIVE


	45. Summer Blues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ah, yes. A nice little throwback to that totally great identity crisis I had a month or two ago where I didn't know if I wanted to be called Priestly or Nux. That was fun. And weird. And scary. But, I like to think that I am over it. We'll see. Heh.

This nervous and restless energy is destroying my nerves and god I am so twitchy and jumpy and there is a pit inside of me that is getting bigger and bigger and my jaw hurts from constantly clenching it and I'm grinding my teeth and picking my scabs and crying all the fucking time and this summer feels like a fever dream and this fucking identity crisis is really getting me down and I feel like I'm gonna puke


	46. a shit sandwich

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> it's early and i'm sad and i do not miss them and i do not need them but dammit it would be nice to be wanted by my own parents but dammit it's early and fuck i don't know i'm wide awake and not tired and really fucking sad and fuck.

my parent’s do not want me

neither one does

that is two of them

count em

fits on one hand

took two to make me

and both of them to send me away

 

i do not have a home with my mother

she has made that more than clear

kicked me out three times

and it was because i had decided that

i was no longer going to let her abuse me

giving her my childhood and 11 years of my life

was more than enough

and for fucks sake

i had already tried to kill myself to get away from her

and it didn’t work

so shit

 

my father is an asshole

never has known how to be a parent

he can do weekends and overnight once in a blue moon

but ask him what’s for dinner

and suddenly he’s your slave

and you’re holding him hostage because of how fickle you are

yup sounds about right

and he just can’t stand not to have his living room any longer

he needs it

he just needs it so terribly

but no no dear one dear heart apple of my eye

he is not kicking you out

just being an abusive and manipulative fuck

 

and i really do wonder

why my mother and him didn’t work out

because after all

they are just the same

abusive

prone to substance abuse

both have been alcoholics

though my mother may be more of a lush now

i don’t know

i don’t live with her anymore

but i guess they didn’t work out

because it must be really hard

to see yourself in the person that you are fucking

and not just in a sexual way

but they are just like you

and goddammit you hate it so much

 

so you leave them

don’t bother being in your only child’s life

until they are seven

and the child cuteness has left

and has been replaced by 

a something

this is not your daughter

this is a fucked up kid

who doesn’t know what the hell they are

but is too afraid to ask or tell 

either one of their parents

because mommy just wants to put bows in her daughter's hair

and daddy just wants to sleep all the fucking time

so hush little baby

keep it under wraps until it kills you

 

and goddammit

i come from a shit sandwich of a family

neither of my parents want me

two slices of abusive and crazy

with me right in the middle

and god

please don’t let me turn out like either one of my parents

i would rather die than be like either of them

and isn’t that sad

but who is surprised

at this point

 

because these two people

pathetic excuses for a parent

both of them

each of them

in the same and their own special ways

can’t even be bothered to try and glue back

together the broken vase pieces of their

son

 

and you know what

i hope the fuckers step on the glass


	47. Anxiety: a narrative

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Here we go! Another school assignment that I managed to make really fucking depressing.  
> The objective was that we had to write a narrative about a: smelly bus, messy room, a mad child (I read man child at first and was really confused), and an anxious student. Of course, I jumped on that one. So, here it is. 
> 
> Honestly, for me, it is really strange to acknowledge my anxiety disorder so fully, and to recognize how it plagues me daily. It's kind of cathartic. In a scary sort of way.

an ulcer waiting to happen

sits in the metaphorical pit of my stomach

it has been there for years

 

I feel it in

the shaking of my hands

from medication that made it chronic

and the fidgeting of myself

 

my feet tap

my knee bounces

and sometimes it is only the

1 2 3 4 of counting my glasses

an earring in each ear

and my septum piercing 

that keeps me sane

 

but that is often not enough

these movements do not quiet

the urges to flee

 

and I curse my anxiety

a disorder that is slowly

eroding my insides and outsides

 

I curse this disorder

from the cuts chewed into my lips

the blunted and bitten fingernails

down to my legs that are always 

ready to go go go

because this isn’t who I was supposed to be


	48. Transphobia Crashcourse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last week or so, some douchebag had the bright and transphobic idea to ask me why I couldn't just be a lesbian. Huh. Believe it or not, that was the first time anyone had asked me that. Sure, I've been asked lots of other uneducated and malicious questions, but this one caught me so off guard that it triggered an anxiety attack that had me hiding in the handicap stall of the woman's restroom, sobbing and banging my head against the wall. Yeah. That was fun.   
> Anyway, I turned that shitty thing into a school assignment/spoken word/rant/fuck you to the transphobes kind of thing. It is cathartic, and makes it easier for me to let this particular shitty thing go.

“Why can’t you just be a tomboy?”

Witty comebacks always come slow when gender is involved, especially with new questions. Surely not new to anyone else, but new to him, at least. Though, it wouldn’t take much to trigger a response, no matter how aggressive or shocked and sad that response might be. But this one, though. This was new. Having never been asked this before, he had no weapons to combat this, to shoot down the asker with a well-placed glare and a retort that would shut them up right away. 

He did try, he really did. You have to give him credit for that.

But then his throat choked up, and he fled. The only thing he managed to choke out was that he was going to go now. That was it. Shut down so quickly. From fearless and untouchable to an anxiety attack shaking its way up his spine and into his hands.

 

“Why can’t you just be a tomboy?”

And there it is again, he thinks. That one sentence wrapping tighter and tighter around his windpipe. 

It was a challenge hurrying down the stairs without falling, because the anxiety had him in such a tight grip that he could hardly breathe.

Then there it was, those dreaded bathrooms. 

 

“Are you a girl or a boy?”

There was not time to spend fifteen minutes or half an hour or all day standing between those two things. With his mind screaming MALE, and his traitorous body screaming FEMALE, he ducked into the women’s restroom and stumbled into the handicap stall.

 

It started then.

A barrage of everything that he had ever been asked because all that people saw were his body: breasts, thick thighs, wide hips, a pear shape with curves in all the right places, and it made him sick.

 

“Since you haven’t had  _ the  _ surgery yet, aren’t you still technically a woman?”

“Butch?”

“Dyke?”

“Are you a boy or a girl?”

“What are you?”

“This is my friend, he’s a transvestite.”

 

It’s too much, with the tomboy comment still rattling around in his exhausted brain.

And with each  _ thunk _ of the back of his head against the tiled bathroom wall, he tried to shake them loose. But they wouldn’t leave. Why wouldn’t they leave? He knows that it isn’t true. None of those people know anything. Their questions are out of mostly out of ignorance, and not malice, but, gods, they all hurt so much. 

 

He talks then, a harsh whisper making its feeble way out on the wave of each choking, silent, sob.

“I  _ tried _ . I tried so hard. And I’ll tell you why I can’t ‘just be a tomboy’ because, dammit, I was a tomboy. And you wanna know what that got me? Six years worth of scars on my arm and shoulder.”

 

He drags the remains of anxiously bitten-down nails down his arm now, over and over again, leaving angry red trails through the pale lines on even paler skin.

“I’ve know that I wasn’t a girl since I was seven. That’s pretty, funny, isn’t it? The not knowing, it almost killed me. I mean that literally, but sometimes swallowing forty pills speaks louder than words.”

 

The phantom voice, branded into his eardrums and stamped angry and red on the graymatter of his brain, speaks up again. “Why can’t you just be a tomboy?”

 

And he knows what the real question is now.

Why can’t you just be a girl?

Why do you have to be  _ transgender _ ?

Why can’t you just be happy as a girl?

Why can’t you just be a tomboy?

 

Getting up off the ground, scrubbing tear tracks from his cheeks and off his glasses, he presses the back of his throbbing head against the tiled wall, whispering to everybody and nobody, “ _ shut up _ .” 


	49. Bio Poem

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was another class assignment, in Psych, that I really liked and decided to post online.  
> It's called a bio poem, and this is the format:  
> First name  
> Word(s) describing you  
> Three things you want  
> Three things you need  
> Three things you feel  
> Three things you fear  
> Three things you would like  
> Three things you love  
> Where you live  
> Last Name
> 
> I did two versions of the poem, one in third person, and the other in first person. I will post/label them both.   
> Also, please feel free to try your hand at this poem, too! I would love to read the results!

My Bio Poem

in third person:

**Priestly**

**Author**

**Who wants** to start T, legally change his name, and top surgery

**Who needs** therapy, medication, and to stop living in fear of being killed for being queer

**Who feels** like a freak, fear, and righteous anger

**Who fears** being killed for being queer, never getting “better,” and having his PTSD define him

**Who would like** to see that his trans brothers and sisters stop being killed, racist cops be held accountable to their actions, and the world becomes a safe space, dammit

**Lover of men** and women (though not bisexual), caffeine, and the smell of new and old books

**Resident of** Rhododendron, Welches, Portland, and the LGBTQ+ community

**Stout**

  
  


My Bio Poem

in first person:

**Priestly**

**Author**

**Who wants** to start T, legally change my name, and top surgery

**Who needs** therapy, medication, and to stop living in fear or being killed for being queer

**Who feels** like a freak, fear, and righteous anger

**Who fears** being killed for being queer, never getting “better,” and having my PTSD define me

**Who would like** to see that my trans brothers and sisters stop being killed, racist cops be held accountable for their actions, and the world becomes a safe space, dammit

**Lover of** men and women (though not bisexual), caffeine, and the smell of new and old books

**Resident of** Rhododendron, Welches, Portland, and the LGBTQ+ community

**Stout**


	50. Funeral Prep

I am going to a funeral

not sure who for

but it could be any one of us

when his men come to our door

 

We’ve spent our lives in closets

content with safety over view

but even that gets old

and damn we just wanted a fresh breath or two

 

So out we came

again and again

a never ending stream

but it felt so good to finally come clean

 

And now here we sit

under the jurisdiction of our new “president”

a man who hates our kind

and a vp who supports conversion therapy

 

So don’t you dare tell us

that we should not be scared

because we have PULSE to back us up

and so many years of the same old bullshit

 

We are tired

and scared

and wary of all

because who knows who could be the reason why we fall

 

So please

I beg of you

come and stand with us

hold our hands but do not speak over us

 

Because we need you

the majorities and all

to stand up to this menace

we do not want to fall

 

I do not want to go to funerals

that could have been prevented

so please friends hear my words

and take them to heart

 

Fore there are already too many hashtags

dedicated to my brothers and sisters

and we must end this campaign of hate

because we the minorities are all tired of going to funerals


	51. diversion tactic

dear doctor crombie

rhymes with cranberry remember

that’s what you told me so that i

would remember your name

and you chuckled like that was

the most clever thing in the world

but all i cared about was getting the hell

out of the damn psychiatric ward because being

in that place made me want to try

and kill myself all over again

which is totally the opposite of

what i was hoping for when i agreed to be

admitted but i digress

 

because what stuck

with me more than the dismal room

i was put in that was either

as hot as hell-fire or freezing cold

to the point where i decided that i’d rather

be able to see my breath than be soaked in sweat

and your shitty-ass joke

was the fact that on our first meeting

you told me that you thought my

coming out as transgender was

nothing more

than a diversion tactic

 

now dr. crombie

i want you to put yourself in my place

i was 16 years old

stimming and shaking as you stared me down

and then labeled me as nothing more than

a diversion tactic

and that crushed me

it had only been a few days since

i swallowed 40 trazodone and accepted

the fact that i would not be waking up again

and that was all you had to say to me

a diversion tactic

you pulled down the very core

of what i was in two words

and my god i hated you so much

in that moment

 

because dr. crombie

i had known i was not a girl

since i was 7 years old

and i held that inside me for 9 long years

that almost killed me

because goddammit

i knew that i wasn’t a girl for longer

than i had lived as a girl

and you just didn’t care

you took what i had given to you

laying myself out before you

because i was a scared

mentally ill teenager 

that had just survived a

fucking suicide attempt

and all you had to say

that my being transgender

was a diversion tactic

 

and even now

three years later

that still haunts me

the fact that you

a heterosexual cisgender male

born with a penis and a flat chest

decided to chalk up my

9 years of hell to nothing more than

_ a diversion tactic _

 

so dr. crombie

tell me what do you think

i was diverting from exactly

when i had willingly been admitted

to a sterile-smelling hellscape

where i was forced to relive

how i tried to forcibly end my life

every day in the bullshit little therapy groups

that made me feel so much older and hollowed out

 

tell me doctor

what exactly was i diverting from

what was i trying to hide from and behind

by putting myself through the hell

of being near constantly dead-named

and misgendered and having to pay

up into the double digits just to change

my legal my deadname

and gender marker from an F to an M

and being told that i was technically still a girl

and being asked why i couldn’t just be a tomboy

a lesbian

a dyke

a butch

why couldn’t i just be a girl huh

why did i have to be a boy

 

so tell me

dr. crombie

rhymes with cranberry

just what exactly was i

fucking diverting from


	52. 30, 29, 28

when you first look at me

and i mean more than a furtive passing glance

what do you see?

and i only ask because i have read

that employers have this thing where

they will analyze a hopeful-hire

in 30 seconds

and then they go off of that

mere 30, 29, 28

and so on

all the way down to 0

of whether or not they will get the job

 

now i am not asking you for a job 

because i do not want to work for you

and you are not offering me a position

as caretaker, worker, cleaner, lover

and even if you were

it would not be accurate

because i am so much more than

30 seconds

 

because in such a short amount of time

that only allows a quick once-over

all that you will come away with

is a mix of stereotypes and an impression

based off of what gender you think i am

 

30, 29, 28

purple haired freak, clown, butch

27, 26, 25

girl, must be a lesbian, what a dyke

24, 23, 22

must have been a cutter at some point

maybe still is, but who can really say?

because the world we live in is getting colder

and hotter and colder and layers upon layers

is the only way to go

21, 20, 19

is she a girl or a boy? who does she think she is?

what should i call her?

18, 17, 16

she she she

15, 14, 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1

0, 0, 0,

girl girl girl 

 

(now let me tell you what

i gleaned from the 30 seconds that

you looked me up and down

like i was nothing more than a slab

of meat and you wanted to

dig a knife into my and cut me into little chunks

 

what i saw in your eyes

it was not nice

and i saw the moment when you

labeled me as a female

because of my breasts

soft and supple and right fucking there

and the societally stereotyped feminine pear shape of my hips

all the way down to where there is no bulge

because how can she be a tranny

when she hasn’t got any bottom dysphoria, huh?

 

and sure that’s a great question

it’s so clever and original

why can’t you just be a tomboy?   
why can’t you just be a lesbian?

why not try being bisexual?

but really the question

the million dollar question

is why can’t you just be a girl?

 

well because i’m not a girl

and i have known this 

since i was 7 years old

and that was fucking terrifying

because i knew for a fact that

i was something else than the doctor

had labeled me as after glancing at

my new born baby self

and thinking: yup, vagina=female

 

and i tried being a tomboy

wearing ripped jeans and converse

and keeping my hair short

wearing baggy sweatshirts to hide

my breasts

but it wasn’t enough

 

and i tried being a lesbian

actually since i did not know what

transgender meant

let alone that there was a word to describe

what i had felt like inside for

9 long damn years

i rationalized that i must have been a lesbian

because that was a quick-fix-easy-answer

to the cuts on my wrist and the misery

i felt whenever someone called me a girl

 

and i tried being bisexual

which came after a lesbian

and before transgender

and yeah sure i guess it worked

but not for long

and then it happened and i knew what

transgender meant and that

i wasn’t a tomboy

a lesbian

or even bisexual

 

and i tried being a girl

but it very nearly killed me

and then it happened

and i knew who and what i was

 

i am a transgender male

my sexuality is pansexual

and no i do not have sex with pans

though that’s really original and not something

i’ve heard so many times already

 

but i know that i am not a woman

and your 30 second analysis of me

does not help you at all

because you see me through a lens

of female, butch, lesbian, she, she, she

and that is not who i am at all)


	53. farewells to old selves

i have said goodbye

more times than i can count

to grandparents

aunts and uncles

a good friend that i thought i would never be older than

 

but saying goodbye to myself

my old self

my girl self

is something that i still grieve from time to time

 

and it is such a disconnect that comes with this

because there was no body

nothing to mourn

 

no coffin

though i prefer to be cremated

i would like to grow into a tree

or be crushed down into a record

that only plays one song

over and over again

 

but nobody sent flowers

or so many casseroles that i had to

ask them to stop because i was

seeing tuna in my dreams

and the dying flowers were making me even sadder

goddammit

 

but no

because there was no body

though there almost was

nothing happened

just my falling asleep

and waking up

 

as if the past nine years had never happened

from seven to sixteen

knowing that something was different in me

and how it almost very nearly killed me

hell i still have the scars

and my insides are probably at least

a bit fucked from those damn pills

 

but i still do not know

how to say goodbye to who i was

who i was labeled because

i was a baby born with a vagina

and of course that automatically equals female

doesn’t it?

 

but there is still such a disconnect

between the old name and who i am now

 

because even though i can get rid of

my breasts

my uterus

and Testosterone will put hair on my face

and give me a happy trail

and my voice will deepen

and i will go through a second puberty

where i want to fuck everything

 

there are people that still see me

as a girl

a she

a lesbian

butch

tomboy

dyke

 

but all they really see are my breasts

and what they assume is in my pants

and that is not who i am

that is not who i ever was

and dammit why can’t they just see

that this saying farewell

to my old self

does not mean i stop being

who i am

 

because i am so much more

than my breasts 

and my vagina

and my ability to nurture a human life

inside my own body

 

i am so much more than my body

and my old selves do not determine who i am

today because today i am alive

and i am so much more than my body

 

i am so much more

than how you see me

i am so much more 


	54. Gender Dysphoria

putting into words

why swimming in the summer

is a thing that does not exist 

be it pool, lake, or river

is almost as difficult and painful

as seeing bare flesh in the mirror

with all the wrong parts

in all the wrong places

and the only thing that goes through

an already moving-too-fast brain

is  _ wrong wrong wrong  _


	55. Pro-Life, Huh?

so you call yourself pro-life

okay, I guess I can pretend to respect that

which then means that you must also

respect the fact that I am very loudly pro-choice

and thanks to science

I know that a bundle of cells

and a living child are not the same thing

 

because an actual fetus is not fully formed

until the third trimester

and by fully formed I mean that it is

for all intents and purpose alive

but before that

there is nothing but a group of cells

there is no brain

no heart

not even pearly pink fingernails

 

so now what, huh?

you’re probably going to keep protesting

Planned Parenthood and harassing the people

that work there, right?

because all that Planned Parenthood does

is condone the vicious and inhumane murder

of defenseless, unborn children, right?

right?

 

either way, you don’t care about the child

once they’re born

all that you care about is making a woman

and other individuals who have a uterus

carry this  _ thing  _ that is literally feeding off of them

and why should a child be brought into this world

if the circumstances through which it was

conceived are non-consensual?

 

because, if you really did care

if you really were “pro-life”

then you would care about the child

after it is born

or better yet

you could turn your attention and time and money

and anger to all the millions of orphans living

in the US

 

ya know, the living children?

with no homes?

with no parents?

packed like sardines in orphanages?

what about them?

do they not matter because they are not a group

of cells, and therefore not defenseless?

and therefore they do not matter?

 

because, 

if you only care about that bundle of cells

and because some states actually make women

and those with uteruses

have funerals for the aborted “child”

then by default whenever a man

masturbates and then ejaculates

shouldn’t he be made to have a separate

funeral for each of the thousands of children

that he just killed?

because one of them could have cured cancer, dammit

 

and tell me

when I was still menstruating

should I have said “amen”

over all the potential children that bled out

of my body and into the pad

and the sides of my boxers?

 

should I have

said “grace” over all the

little pad mummies that I threw away?

should I have cried when I flushed

the bloody toilet paper?

 

because,

since I have a uterus

how dare I want and feel as if I should

be owed control over my own body, right?

 

how dare I believe that

each and every woman

biological and otherwise

have a say in what they do with their body

how dare I be pro-choice, right?

 

well, let me knock you down 

a few pegs with this closing statement:

if you only care about the “child” when it is

just a group of cells that doesn’t feel a damn thing

and couldn’t care less about it

once it is born

and homeless

or an orphan

or queer

then you are not “pro-life”

what you are

is an asshole


	56. The Funny Thing Is

 

the funny thing is

when my mom was together with my dad

\--like as a thing and he would

run to the pay phone across the street from where

he lived whenever his pager went off that

she was calling him--

his dad asked her is she was going to

give him a grandson

and my mom

being the person that she is

told me that she laughed and said maybe

 

the funny thing is

when i was born and the midwife

announced that i was a girl

my nan who had mistook my umbilical cord

for a penis leaned over and asked

the midwife if they were sure

 

the funny thing is

my grandfather’s mother

she always thought that i was a boy

and yes i know that she had alzheimers

and was not all there

but now i feel like she was able to

see through my dresses and long hair

to the boy that i would one day be

 

the funny thing is

i was often mistaken for a boy as a child

and when that happened there was always

a little burst of warmth because yes

i was a boy

i looked like a boy

i felt like a boy

but no no no 

silly girl they all would say

 

the funny thing is

when i first met my father’s father

my grandfather if you will

i was a lesbian

and in texas that isn’t a widely accepted thing

and i was told a lot during my two week visit

that i just hadn’t found the right man yet

and so now that i am a man

i wonder what they would tell me now

 

the funny thing is

i don’t have bottom dysphoria

have a vagina does not bother me

i like being able to comfortably ride a bike

and read erotic novels in public 

without it being obvious that that is

what i am doing

 

the funny thing is

my grandfather’s mother

who we all called papa lucy

died before i realized that i wasn’t a girl

i had that terrifying revelation at seven

and though my memory is foggy

through much of my childhood

she passed a year or two prior to that

and no i do not mean it is funny that

she died because that is terrible and i loved

her with all my heart

but it is funny that she saw who it would take

me nine years to be

and i didn’t get to reintroduce myself to her

and tell her she was right

 

the funny thing is

now that i am a boy

i am near-constantly misgendered

and it seems that no amount of slouching

or wearing a binder under it feels like my

ribs are cracking with every breath

and wearing pronoun buttons on my sweatshirt

and bright rainbow beanie 

is enough to make people see otherwise

 

but dammit i am a boy

and my nan thought i was a boy

and my papa lucy knew i was a boy

and i used to get mistaken for a boy

before i grew hips and tits

and despite all those things i am still

a boy and i always have been and i always

will be and the really not funny thing about that is that

people seem so eager to tell me i am wrong

and try to force me back into the box of

daughter and woman and mother and sister

and no i will not be those things

and it is not my fault that i live in this world

where they do not know what 

a body other than theirs means and how terrifying it is

to realize you are not the girl you were raised as at such a

young age you do not have words to describe how you feel

and they do not know

and they will not know

until they shut their mouths and open their minds

 

so please do

before any more of my transgender brothers and sisters

have to die for your ignorance and hate and fear

because there is nothing funny about that


	57. From Birth to Boy

i was born into erickson’s fifth stage of life

jumping right into the identity versus identity confusion

because everybody else thought they knew who

and what i was

and since i lacked the control of my tongue and vocal cords

to say otherwise

i was given a female name and gender

 

and that is what i grew up in

always feeling just a little bit wrong

especially at seven years old

when it really hit me that maybe i was broken

because i didn’t feel like a girl

but there were no words that i knew of

to describe and explain what i was

 

and that is what i grew up in

feeling perpetually caught in between

what others saw me as

and what i felt

what i knew to be true about myself

 

but how do you tell your parents that they

that the doctors

were wrong in giving you the female gender?

 

i grew up in that confusion

terrified when my body turned against me

at twelve or thirteen

and became fertile in preparation of the

life that i was not going to give it

 

and it took me nine years

from seven to sixteen

to find a word for what i was

and that just felt like a thousand years

to the child i used to be

 

and it very nearly killed me too

it probably would have

but i’ve always been stubborn about things

i felt i was right about

and i knew without a doubt

that i was correct on this account

 

and now here i am

stood before you

never knowing what those other stages of life felt like

because i was birthed right into the thick of things

and even if i could

i wouldn’t want to go back

because it took me so long

of feeling broken and wrong

to realize that sometimes people are incorrect

and that is not their fault

but neither is it mine for correcting them

and i am not going to apologize for that

because i shouldn’t have to apologize

for being transgender 

 


	58. a love letter to my mustache

dear mustache,

i used to hate you

because of how dark and prominent

you were against the almost pallor

of my skin

 

people would 

make fun of me for you

in middle school especially

but kids are mean

and i stood out in more

ways than my mustache

that would have been more fitting

on a prepubescent teenage boy

than an angry lesbian 

 

i was

shamed into waxing you away

which hurt so much the first time

that i almost cried

but what hurt more than the hot wax

was my father

whose genes gifted me with 

darker and coarser hair

always encouraging me to

bleach you away into an acceptable

shade of invisible

 

and then

when a switch was thrown

inside my body that had

been crying out from the still

tender age of seven that my being

called a girl was

wrong wrong wrong

 

you were 

there still having always

come back after the wax and bleach

 

but that 

fine line of hairs above

my upper lip

you made me feel more masculine

you made me hate myself less

 

you make me feel more masculine

you make me hate myself less


	59. i was a teenage lesbian

i was a crappy

12 or 13 year old lesbian

coming out to my friends at lunch

almost choking on my juice

when they said that they already knew

and their immediate acceptance made

me so relieved that i forgot

to chastise them for not

having told me sooner

 

and i loved my

first girlfriend 

like how just seeing her would

let loose a stream of butterflies

into my stomach and i adored every

single one of them

 

and i loved my

girlfriend even when our

first kiss made the inside of

my bottom lip bleed

but she held my hand

and that made everything alright

 

but i was a

crappy teenage lesbian

because i still felt things

for boys

 

boys taller than me

and the same height

with their blue

and brown and green eyes

and short hair that i wanted

both on my head

and on my face

 

and and and i

didn’t know if i wanted

to be  _ with _ the boys

or  _ be _ the boys

 

but my girlfriend with

her soft hands and softer lips

imploring me to crawl into

bed with her on those

early mornings when we

were both a little less than half awake

even she couldn’t make that ache

of wrongness go away

 

and i was a

crappy and angry and

even more confused than before

teenage lesbian girl

but i was just so bad at it

because the part of me

that rationalized i must have been

a queer woman

got so much smaller

that i felt like an imposter

in my own sexual identity 

 

and and and i

longed to be a boy

with a strong jawline

and hair on my face

and a flat chest

and and and i

just didn’t want to be me anymore

because the real me

he wasn’t a girl

 

and and and the

real me that he

inside of me

for so many years

is able to love boys and girls

and not feel guilty for it

because love is love is love

and i am still alive 

to enjoy it


	60. not gay as in happy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The title is from a quote, the full quote being: “not gay as in happy, but queer as in fuck you.”

you killed all the 

nice queer people and all

that’s left is me

with my shaking hands

and cracking voice

and fear giving way to anger

and a tiredness that nestles

ever deeper into my bones

 

and monday the 20th is

the 18th transgender day of remembrance

where the community mourns all

of its trans and nonbinary and genderfluid

and gender nonconforming siblings

because they were killed for

daring to be themselves

in a world that would rather

bury their dead sons and daughters

than have a child who changed their

name and gender marker

to the right ones

 

because being trans and queer

in a trump america

is an act of deviance and rebellion

where i could get beaten up for

using the mens room

and it would be my fault

because i am other

i am a freak

they do not understand me

and therefore that makes

me the enemy

 

but you have sat next to me

on the bus

in the movie theater

in the bathroom stall next to mine

while my anxiety mounted as

i waited for the bathroom to clear

out so i could leave safely

and i know when you look at me

you do not know what box

to force me into

 

and i want to know

you owe us all the answer

of how many more of our

siblings have to die before

you realize that we are people too

i am as human as you are

my correct hormones are just store-bought

and i had to claw my way into

the words of brother

and son

and nephew

and grandson

and boy boy boy

and male male male

 

but you have killed all the

nice queer people and all

you have left is me

and i am making my anger

into a louder voice

that will never be silenced

because you can cut out

my tongue and you can

take away my basic human rights

and you can even kill me

 

but the truth is that you will

always be more afraid of me

than i am of you

because while you kill 

what you do not understand

i embrace it 


	61. The End

She saw this moment as the end

The pills were sticky from sweaty palms, 

gripped tight in shaking hands

And the numbers, 

the milligrams, 

ticked slowly upwards, 

clearing 5,000 but staying short of 10,000

 

This was the end, 

her end, 

orchestrated and carried out alone

This was cold toes curling into ugly carpet that hid years

of shed blood and tears

This was swallowing one last pill and feeling panic bloom

at the realization of the close

 

The heaviness of her body,

eyes unable to stay open,

head spinning down onto the pillow

 

This was the end,

this was her end

A young body pulled into nothingness

A young girl,

long dead,

finally letting go of her corpse

 

She saw this moment as the end

 

And his eyes flew open,

guts roiling and gasping into a state of being

laid dormant

for far too long


	62. Diss For EE Uh

these days i am stuck

choosing between binding and breathing

because nobody knew to tell me

that wearing this less severe corset

for more than eight hours at a time

could turn my ribs into a steel trap

around my lungs and my skin

would be able to count the seconds

that ticked by as that fabric

rubbed tighter and tighter 

against my body

 

but it was worth it

at least for the first few minutes

until my breath became trapped

inside my body somewhere

between my lungs and my

nose and my mouth

and climbing three flights of stairs

from one class to the next felt

like running a marathon

with my legs tied together

 

and standing naked from the

waist up in the women’s bathroom

hating every second of wrestling the

binder off of sweat-soaked skin

made me want to reach into

my body through sheer force of will

and years of hatred

and scoop out the fat that made

up my breasts

 

and i am accustomed to this

the want to remove the parts

of me that make people

tie me to the words

of she

and girl

and her

and mother

and sister

and woman

and and and

those things that i am not

those things that i never was

those things that i never will be

 

wanting to cut off

the parts of me that continue to lock

me into the involuntary box of

the female gender

makes me feel like a freak

and a monster

and a bad person for not loving

the body that a god with a penchant

for sick jokes stuck me in

 

but some days the dysphoria 

makes it tempting to choose

binding over breathing

because even though my tolerance

for doing so is only about an hour

at this point isn’t an hour of relief

better than nothing at all


	63. this body/my body

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heeey, I'm not dead, and my dysphoria is absolute shit *finger guns*

i like to think that

i know you like the 

back of my hand

but the only thing

the peaks and valleys of

your body do for me

is make me nauseous

 

this is a landscape

that my hands cannot

explore without shaking

fingers curling into useless fists

that only know how to

try and pummel this soft flesh

into a shape it was not

originally born in to

 

and there are no more

trees here now

because the force of my

hatred towards this body

burned them all down

because this body is not

a temple or a church i 

feel able to worship in

since this is not a god

i want to believe in

 

because believing in a god

that would zip me into this skin

and just watch as i try

to cut my way out of it

for nine years

six of those being with sharp edges

and jagged nails

and purple hollows under my eyes

there is no beauty in that

 

it is hard to write beautiful

poetry about a body i

spent more time hating and

feeling trapped in than i did

knowing how to live happily

 

but my god i am trying

i promise that i am 

even if my hands shake

while trying to hold

the her that i used to be

close 


End file.
